Well he did not guess so ill, but thou, thou knewest me--in thy
sleep--knewest me as I am, and not as I seemed to be, yes," she added
softly, "and didst say certain sweet words which I remember well."
"Then beneath that shroud was thine own face," asked Leo again, for he
was very curious on this point, "the same lovely face I see to-day?"
"Mayhap--as thou wilt," she answered coldly; "also it is the spirit that
matters, not the outward seeming, though men in their blindness think
otherwise. Perchance my face is but as thy heart fashions it, or as my
will presents it to the sight and fancy of its beholders. But hark! The
scouts have touched."
As Ayesha spoke a sound of distant shouting was borne upon the wind,
and presently we saw a fringe of horsemen falling back slowly upon our
foremost line. It was only to report, however, that the skirmishers of
Atene were in full retreat. Indeed, a prisoner whom they brought with
them, on being questioned by the priests, confessed at once that the
Khania had no mind to meet us upon the holy Mountain. She proposed to
give battle on the river's farther bank, having for a defence its waters
which we must ford, a decision that showed good military judgment.
So it happened that on this day there was no fighting.
All that afternoon we descended the slopes of the Mountain, more swiftly
by far than we had climbed them after our long flight from the city of
Kaloon.
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